The Fall
by Gohan Roxas
Summary: A year before Deepground rose from the ashes of Midgar, a man named Bauer was training to become a Tsviet. But he was betrayed. Now he has returned, and he's hell-bent on revenge. Possible Shalua/OC. Rated for violence and language. Vincent and Shalua as characters because they're the mains (except for my OC, Bauer).
1. Basic Training

"_Bauer!"_

_ "Rea! No!"_

_ The girl screamed; a blood-curdling, horrible sound. A chilling, altered laugh accompanied it._

_ "Rea!" the boy roared, his voice shattered from his racking sobs._

_ The screams ended, never to begin again._

_ "NO!"_

* * *

He woke up.

"Good morning, Master Bauer," the omnipresent man greeted him.

The man panted, sweat pouring down his shirtless form. He ran a hand through his dark hair and unleashed a strangled sigh.

"The same dream again?" the other man asked him, his voice showing no concern or sympathy whatsoever.

Bauer nodded, still panting.

"Your uniform is prepared, sir. The Restrictor has summoned you."

"Thank you, Usher."

The man – Usher – nodded and stepped out.

Bauer eyed his uniform. Black, with stripes of blue neon running through it. Unlike most basic troops, he did not wear the regulation-issue helmet. He sighed and pulled it on. _Best to get this over with_, he glumly told himself. _Being summoned by the Restrictor is rarely a good thing._

He stepped out of his room and walked past a few other troops. "Hail Deepground!" they shouted, saluting him.

He returned their salute half-heartedly. "Hail Deepground." He kept walking, straight into the office of the Restrictor.

His master wore a flowing black and blue robe, and a stylised helm on his head. When he spoke, his voice came out as a metallic, frightening thing.

"Sir!" Bauer straightened. "You summoned me, sir."

"Indeed," the Restrictor murmured hollowly, placing the file he was reading onto the desk. "I am recommending you be promoted to full Tsviet status."

Bauer's eyes widened. "Sir?"

"Did you not hear me?" The enigmatic man sounded amused. "I am recommending you be trained to become a Tsviet."

"A Tsviet, sir?"

The helm moved in a nod. "You would be working with the likes of Rosso the Crimson, Azul the Cerulean… Weiss the Immaculate…"

Bauer gasped quietly. Weiss was a living legend.

"You will begin your training under Argento. Understood?"

"Yes sir!"

Though Bauer could not see it, he was sure the Restrictor smiled. "Excellent. Leave me."

He saluted and left the office quietly.

* * *

In another room, the small girl removed the strange headset; her blue eyes glowed orange briefly. "Bauer Fray," she said in a robotic voice.

The gigantic man thudded behind her. He had blue lights carved across his face. "What of him?" he rumbled.

"He is to be promoted to Tsviet."

The man chuckled lowly. "This will be intriguing. Isn't he your target?"

The girl nodded. "I have been performing a nightly SND on him for the past five years." Her blank face broke into a smirk. "He will be the perfect pawn for Lord Weiss."

* * *

The simulation was brutal. Bauer's twin pistols were working overtime battling the holographic WRO troops. It was, apparently, only a matter of time before Deepground rose from the ashes of Midgar and waged war on the World Regenesis Organization.

The harsh voice of Argento pierced his mind. "Focus, Bauer!" she sneered.

He gritted his teeth and opened fire upon the false enemies once again.

An older man in a long blue robe appeared before him. The man's bearded face was curled in a sneer, and his black hair appeared to be well-loved. He clutched a battered old rifle.

Without hesitation, Bauer raised both his pistols and shot the man in the chest. He stumbled and would have fallen had he not disintegrated into data before he landed on the hard metal floor.

Argento walked towards him, clapping ironically. "Well done. Mercy is not a weakness a Tsviet should have. Now, if only that had been the real Reeve Tuesti."

Bauer chose to ignore her.

"I am speaking to you," she sneered. "You will look at me when I…"

He wheeled and pointed a pistol at her head. "If you're looking to provoke me," he said from behind clenched teeth, "you succeeded. Now, unless you want your silver-coated brains spread across the walls, be quiet."

Argento's eyes flashed, then she smiled. A laugh escaped her throat. "Excellent. I think you're ready for the test."

He lowered the gun and eyed her suspiciously. "Test?"

She nodded. "Tomorrow, you will battle a Tsviet and numerous Deepground soldiers. Be victorious, and you will be a Tsviet yourself. Fail… Well…" She chuckled evilly. "Let's just say that not many people survive long after failing."

Cautious, he placed one hand on his gun. "Is that a threat?"

She shook her head, amused. "No. It's a promise."

* * *

"_I will make her suffer," the man sneered, "and then you will suffer yourself!"_

_ "Bauer, run!" the girl screamed, clutching at the arm wrapped around her neck._

_ "No!" Bauer refused. "I made a promise to keep you safe, Rea!"_

_ The stranger cackled. "How sweet. A promise for a girl's hero to keep her safe."_

_ Bauer clenched his fists and teeth in hatred._

_ "All for naught." The man placed one hand on Rea's head and spun her neck to one side with a sickening snap._

_ "REA!"_

* * *

He bolted upright, panting heavily. He massaged his head to rid himself of the dull headache.

It got worse every night. The cause of death of this girl – his sister Rea, if the dreams were to be believed – changed every night, but always at the hands of this shady man. Oddly, he felt as if he was well-acquainted with him.

"Your examination is today, Master Bauer," Usher told him, appearing from nowhere.

Bauer nodded and walked towards his uniform.

Usher blocked his way. "The Restrictor has instructed that you are to wear this." He indicated a uniform vaguely similar to his own, though it had no sleeves and bore a grey chestplate with the Deepground logo. Heavy metallic gloves also sat with the uniform. Bauer nodded and changed into the new uniform; unsurprisingly, it fit perfectly.

"I am allowed to inform you of the details of your examination," Usher began.

Bauer nodded and looked at him, silently urging him to continue.

"You will be battling numerous generic troops on your way to your Tsviet target: Shelke the Transparent."

"Shelke?"

Usher nodded. "She is a technical genius who wields energy batons. Her speed is impressive, and she has the ability to blend in with her surroundings. Despite her diminutive size, she is a formidable opponent."

"Diminutive size?" Bauer mused to himself. He turned back to his mentor. "Care to elaborate?"

Usher nodded again. "Shelke was…recruited…by Deepground eight years ago at the age of nine. She receives daily injections of mako to keep her youthful form; without it, she will die."

Bauer's eyes widened.

"Never mind that," Usher said then. "You are late. Go."

"Yes sir," he saluted ironically.

* * *

Bauer shot the final trooper in the chest. The bullets he was using were sedative; Deepground would not lose any troops to the Lifestream today…with the possible exception of himself, should he fail.

He heard minute steps behind him. He pointed a gun into what seemed to be open air.

The air glimmered and a girl who appeared to be only nine appeared. Her blue eyes were devoid of any life, and she wore a uniform similar to his own. "Impressive," she said tonelessly.

His impassive expression did not change.

"I had not expected you to discover me so easily, if at all," Shelke the Transparent continued, drawing her batons from their holsters on her legs. She activated them and her eyes flashed orange. "Unfortunately, your journey to Tsviet ends here." She leapt at him with inhuman speed.

Bauer managed to roll and dodge the attack; he wheeled and fired his pistols at her. She ran along the walls, flailing her batons fiercely. Bauer's guns clicked empty, and in that moment Shelke struck.

Bauer delivered a kick to her abdomen, sending her flying. He used that brief reprieve to reload and resume fire. One of his sedative bullets hit her in the leg, and it went numb. She slumped to her knees, and Bauer launched forward and shot her in the chest. She gasped and fell.

Bauer spun his pistols and holstered them, staring down at the unconscious form.

A slow clap began from somewhere. He looked up to see that Weiss was the one who'd clapped. His face was blank, his eyes covered by his white hair. Beside him, his brother Nero stood impassive, his arms crossed in his straitjacket. Nearby, Rosso and Azul also started clapping. Rosso's face was twisted in a sadistic grin.

All around him, people started clapping, congratulating him on his success. The Restrictor stood impassive.

He had made it. He was a Tsviet.


	2. Vengeance

The honeymoon period would not last. Bauer's first assignment as a Tsviet? A joint training session with Rosso the Crimson and Azul the Cerulean…against Weiss the Immaculate.

Bauer tested his pistols; they were fully loaded, and he had bullets to spare.

Rosso smirked. "You are nervous, correct?" she asked him in her odd dialect. He could not place it. For all he knew, she was from Cactus Island.

He shook his head. "Tsviets don't get nervous."

Azul laughed. "It appears that our cub has claws."

His fist clenched, but he did not return serve.

In front of them, the shirtless Weiss sat in his iron chair, his head down. Anyone who did not know him would believe he was either sleeping or dead.

Rosso drew her double-sided gunblade from her shoulders and Azul pulled out his massive cannon. Bauer grimly drew his pistols.

Weiss's head rose; his face twisted into a malicious grin as he picked up his swords. Without any preamble, he lashed out at the trio.

Rosso, Azul and Bauer opened fire on Weiss, who left a blurred white form as he shifted through the air. All the bullets and missiles missed.

Weiss appeared behind them and slashed with his swords. The trio jumped back to dodge; Rosso flailed with her blades, and Weiss blocked every blow.

Azul roared and shot another missile at the white-haired man, who again dodged.

Bauer shouted a warning to his partners and began to spin on the spot, firing his pistols even as he attacked.

Weiss appeared behind him and kicked him in the back. He cried out and fell.

The white-haired man struck Rosso and Azul with his swords; the two Tsviets cried out and collapsed.

Bauer struggled to his feet and gasped when he saw Azul and Rosso start to leak dark tendrils. Their bodies shifted and changed; they were becoming monsters.

Azul was morphing into what resembled a Behemoth; his skin became scaly, and he grew horns. His hands became claws, and when the transformation was complete, he roared.

Rosso, on the other hand, didn't change much. Red began to spread from her eyes to form scars on her face and the rest of her exposed skin. Her teeth morphed into fangs, and she developed claws. She hissed at Weiss, who simply smirked.

The Immaculate raised his swords and fired a bullet from them. Unbelievably, the bullets hit instantly and the monstrous forms of Bauer's training partners fell; they immediately returned to normal.

A ghostly chuckle rang out. The Restrictor appeared, clapping his gloved hands. "Well done," he said ironically.

Weiss glared at him. Rosso and Azul rose up, their hands on their weapons.

The Restrictor laughed again. "So this is your plan, eh? You wish to rebel against me?" He cackled.

Bauer's mind snapped. He had heard that cackle before. Every night, in his dreams.

He roared and launched himself at the Restrictor, his hands raised in claws.

Contemptuously, the Restrictor grabbed Bauer's throat and choked him. Bauer gagged from the lack of air entering his lungs. The Restrictor scoffed and threw Bauer to the floor.

"How dare you?" the Restrictor sneered. "I have given you all I have to give. You could have been one of the Tsviets' great…"

One of Weiss's swords was suddenly poking out of his chest. The Restrictor gagged and slid off the sword, dead.

Shelke and Nero the Sable walked in. The girl looked down contemptuously at Bauer, who was still gasping for air. "You attacked the Restrictor."

Bauer stared up at her.

"You believed you were avenging the death of your sister, Rea."

His eyes widened.

Shelke, surprisingly, laughed. "There was no sister. You saw flashes of my own memory, modifying them to convince you the Restrictor had murdered your sister."

Weiss knelt down next to him. "Much like your name suggests, you are nothing more than a pawn."

Bauer took in deep breaths as he tried to comprehend what he was being told.

The Tsviets walked out, laughing at him.

His fingers clenched on the floor and he let loose an inhuman scream; a scream of loss and rage.

His vision started to blur. Clearly the loss of oxygen had done something to him. Before his vision disappeared completely, Bauer saw a pair of legs.

He blacked out and heard the voices of two women. They spoke names.

_Shelke…_

_ Vincent…_

Then they spoke together.

_I'm so sorry._


	3. Revival

The words swirled through his head.

_There was no sister._

_ You are nothing more than a pawn._

_ Tsviet._

_ All for naught._

_ Restrictor._

_Failure._

_ Disgrace._

_**Vengeance.**_

His eyes snapped open.

He was inside a mako tank. His surroundings were shattered ruins, blood and rusted metal lying all over the floor.

His fists clenched. His last memory was the Tsviets tearing the life he'd thought he'd lived from him. They were not here. How he longed for them to be.

He longed to tear their lives from them, like they did him.

His arms raised and pummelled on the glass, his mouth open in a silent scream. Cracks started to form in the tank. With one more furious punch, the glass shattered and he fell to the floor, coughing. He stood up slowly and again looked around. He glanced at his hands, which were now gloveless. Blood trickled from his knuckles.

_Good._

Bauer was alive.

He raised his head and laughed. It was a sound of pain…of relief… Maybe even of madness.

Bauer took a shaky step forward and spotted a report. It proclaimed that Deepground was launching a counter-offensive on the WRO after their first offensive ended in the capture of Shelke the Transparent and the 'death' of Azul the Cerulean. His fists clenched. Two Tsviets with one bullet. His face grim, he threw the report to the ground and walked out of the facility.

Once out, he was startled to find that it was a mako reactor. He'd been in the basement for a brief period of time.

"Hey!" a man's voice called to him. He turned and saw a Deepground soldier pointing his gun at him. "Who are you? State your…"

Bauer lashed out at the man, kicking his feet out from under him. He then took the man's gun and slammed the butt into the helmeted head. The soldier went still.

He looked around covertly, then stripped the guard, replacing his accursed Tsviet uniform with that of the Deepground soldier. Once that was done, he shouldered the rifle and shot the trooper in the chest.

For the first time in his life, Bauer had killed a man.

This would not be the last time, either.

He put on the helmet and made his way towards a nearby transport, packed with Deepground troops.

"What's taking you so long?!" one of them demanded.

"An escaped prisoner," Bauer replied calmly, thankful that the helmet masked his voice. "He won't be a problem anymore."

The answer seemed to satisfy the man. "Come on, get in. It's about time we show those WRO bastards what's what!"

Bauer nodded, though he had no intention of killing any WRO troops. He stepped into the transport, his fingers clutching the rifle to stop himself from ripping every single soldier in the vehicle apart.

* * *

The WRO Headquarters were in ruins. Bauer looked up at the building and walked past the hulking mass of metal that had once been a mech. Oddly, it had claw marks and bullet holes all over it. Were the WRO using monsters now?

He checked his belt to make sure his new pistols were still there. He'd managed to…_convince_ their former owners to part with them.

Two Deepground troops ran up to him. "Hey, I thought we were getting…"

Bauer shot them both in the chest, killing them. He found that, unlike Rosso, he did not enjoy killing; rather, he saw it as a means to an end, that end being the ultimate defeat of the Tsviets.

A woman's voice suddenly broke through his reverie.

_"Shelke! Get out of here!"_

He stopped, listening to the voice.

_"I'm sorry I wasn't a better sister."_

Not knowing why, Bauer followed the voice. When he got to the source of it, he found a woman using a slowly-breaking mechanical arm to prop open a door.

Behind her was Azul the Cerulean, his muscles knotting, his ugly face twisted into an expression of horrid glee.

"Shelke…" the woman murmured, and his ears propped up. He'd heard that voice in his head, many times. "Know that I will always…love you…"

The door slammed as the woman's metallic arm was crushed. Azul chuckled to himself and reared his fist to deliver a killer blow.

Bauer leaped towards the woman, tackling her out of the way. He immediately stood up and pointed his rifle at Azul.

The Tsviet glared balefully at him. "Why do you stand in my way?"

Bauer gritted his teeth but did not reply.

Azul stopped. "Hail Weiss."

Still he did not move.

The Cerulean chuckled. "No matter. I will kill you as well." He raised his fist.

"You betrayed me!" Bauer suddenly roared.

Azul froze, his face confused.

"You betrayed me, and left me to die!" He lowered his rifle and ripped his helmet off; he drew his pistols. "Remember me now?"

Azul smirked. "Weiss will be quite interested to learn that you still live. Perhaps you are more than a pawn."

"More than you know," Bauer sneered.

Azul chuckled to himself and walked away, his footsteps thudding.

* * *

The red-cloaked man looked at the steel door, confused. Hadn't Shalua only recently been standing there? What happened to her? What about Azul? His gaze moved to Shelke, who stood there, her eyes wide, muttering, "Why?" over and over again.

The door started to slide open. Startled, the man flicked back his cloak to grab his gun. Behind him, Shelke gasped.

A man with dark hair in the Deepground uniform walked in, carrying Shalua over his shoulder. His face was set, but showed no hostility. "Put the gun away," the man murmured. "If we're gonna save this woman's life, we have to act now."

* * *

Shalua now resided in a mako tank, her good eye closed. A team of two WRO officers – one a medic, the other a mechanic – were working on a replacement unit for her lost arm. Apparently, she would be able to actually use this one, rather than have it rest limply by her side.

Yuffie Kisaragi stood in front of the mako tank that contained Shalua, her face worried. "They said she might not wake up. Even though that guy saved her…" She looked at the man in the Deepground uniform, who was leaning on the door, his arms crossed. "…her injuries are severe. It'd take a long time to get her fixed up." She wheeled on the red-cloaked man. "Vincent! You were there! Why couldn't you have helped her?!"

The man – Vincent – looked away from her.

Shelke walked in, her face still blank and expressionless. "She is a fool."

Yuffie walked to her and made to slap her, but Vincent held her back.

A gun cocked behind Shelke's head. Yuffie gasped.

The strange man was holding a pistol to the Tsviet's skull.

"Why?" Shelke asked tonelessly.

"Why?" the man spat, his voice ragged. "You have the nerve to ask me why?! You damn well know why! You gave me a false life, only to rip it away from me!"

Vincent looked at him. _What the hell's going on here?_

Shelke turned to face him. "Bauer Fray," she said, her eyes flashing with some form of emotion. Fear, perhaps.

The man's finger twitched on the trigger, but he did not pull it.

She looked him dead in the eye for a moment, before murmuring – in two voices, it seemed – "I am sorry."

Vincent gasped. He knew one of those voices.

The man's resolve began to waver and he dropped to his knees, sobbing. The gun lay beside him, forgotten. He continued to sob, his fingers tightening on the floor.

Vincent walked up to him and placed a hand on his shoulder. The man looked up and nodded, the tears stilling. He stood up and retrieved his gun, holstering it.

"My name is Bauer Fray," he told them. "I was once a Tsviet, before they betrayed me." He did not look at Shelke when he said it. "If you intend on fighting Deepground, I will help you."

* * *

Bauer looked up at the mako tank that contained the woman – Shalua Rui, he'd been told – with an odd expression on his face. He'd changed out of the stolen Deepground uniform and now wore plain grey clothing, with an armoured vest over it. The WRO logos had been removed from the vest, a request from Bauer himself.

"Worried about her?" a gravelly voice asked. Bauer turned to see the man he now knew as Vincent Valentine walking towards him, his metal greaves clicking on the floor.

Bauer shook his head. "Not exactly. It's just…" He trailed off.

"Hm? Just what?"

He sighed. "I feel as if I'm…connected to her. I…I can't explain why. I just do. And… Until a few hours ago, all I wanted to do was kill both Azul and Shelke. Then…" He looked up at Shalua again.

Vincent grunted, then looked at the brave woman himself. "When I first met Shalua in Edge, she said she was searching for her reason to live."

"Hm?" Bauer turned to him.

"It was Shelke. Ten years ago, Shelke was taken from her by Shinra as a SOLDIER candidate. They put her into Deepground instead. Through experiments, she was made emotionless, and trapped in the body of a nine-year-old, dependant on daily mako injections."

Bauer dropped his head. She was as much a victim of Deepground as he was.

"Shalua lost her arm, her eye, and many of her organs fighting against Shinra," Vincent continued. "All for her sister."

Bauer was choking up at the tragic tale, but he pushed it aside. "Your point?"

"Everyone has a reason to live, a reason to fight. Yours was revenge."

"Was?"

A trace of a smile appeared on Vincent's stoic face. "I think that you might just have found a new one." He nodded to Shalua and left.

Bauer's eyebrows knitted together. What did Vincent mean by that?

From the corner of his eye, he saw Shalua's good arm twitch. His eyes widened; he ran to the door and called for a medic.


End file.
